Syracuse, N.Y. -- Now that the Dallas Cowboys have fallen to 1-7 and Jerry Jones, halfway through the season he thought would end in a homestanding Super Bowl for his club, has been embarrassed, we wait to see who will be thrown through those Texas doors and out onto the street.

Wade Phillips, the head coach who introduced the Flutie Curse to Buffalo, seems all but done, even if Jones declared otherwise just the other day. But in these parts, the more interesting question may be: What becomes of Paul Pasqualoni?

In his second tour of duty with the Cowboys, Pasqualoni -- who worked as the Syracuse University football bossman for 14 years, but not with the professorial look he currently sports -- is Dallas’ defensive line coach. And the statistics are not his friend.

Indeed, the Cowboys have yielded 179 points in their current five-game losing streak. And, specifically, in their last three defeats, each of the Dallas foes -- the Giants, the Jaguars and the Packers -- have rushed for more than 100 yards while averaging 40.3 points per contest.

This cannot bode well for Paul. Meanwhile, Dave Campo, the Cowboys’ secondary coach who toiled for three seasons as an Orange aide under Dick MacPherson, should probably not send his laundry out any time soon, either.

There had been those who’d recently touted Pasqualoni as a dandy interim head coach in the likely event that Phillips gets fired. The thinking was that Paul, the ultimate football soldier who understands the value of organization, discipline and saying absolutely nothing of consequence for public consumption, would make for a nice bridge until Jones could import his next lead (lap?) dog.

As Pasqualoni, 61 and perhaps (perhaps) winding down (and having earned more money than he'll ever spend), would have no agenda other than serving the Dallas mother ship, this did make some sense. But the more the Cowboys have lost -- and this, with a defense that is less granite than yarn and has allowed more points than any outfit except for Buffalo -- the less appealing Paul’s candidacy appears to have become.

But then, somebody is almost certain to be given that “interim” tag, and Pasqualoni -- who went 107-59-1 at SU, led the Orange to a final No. 6 ranking in 1992 and won 35 games during the Donovan McNabb Era -- would wear it rather professionally.

We’ll see, though. And we may see soon.

“There are,” said Jones, “a lot of people here who are going to suffer and suffer consequences. I’m talking about within the team -- players, coaches who have got careers.”

The clock isn’t ticking in Dallas. It gongs. And Paul Pasqualoni has always had good ears.

(Bud Poliquin’s freshly-written on-line commentaries, his columns and his “To The Point” observations appear virtually every day on syracuse.com. His work can also be regularly found on the pages of The Post-Standard newspaper. Additionally, he can be heard Mondays through Fridays (10 a.m.-12 noon), on the “Bud & the Manchild” sports-talk radio show on The Score 1260-AM. E-mail: bpoliquin@syracuse.com).